They are as sick that surfeit with too much,
As they that starve with nothing
Merchant of Venice
And now for a few days we struck a period of bad luck. Our larder was empty save for tins of food kept for dire emergencies, and the men affected to be weak from scant rations. In any other caravan they would never, or hardly ever, have had them supplemented by flesh food; but we had thoroughly spoiled them. Game grew scarce, even the ubiquitous dik-dik was absent, and any shot we got on these flying excursions of ours away from the base camp we bungled. The more we failed the more disconcerted we became. How true it is nothing succeeds like success! At last matters got so bad we both of us always politely offered the other the chance of a miss. I would first decline to take it, and then Cecily. Meanwhile the buck made good its escape. We both got backward in coming forward, and, in American parlance, were thoroughly rattled.
At last I volunteered to go out early one morning with Clarence, and we put up a bunch of aoul some five hundred yards away. They winded us, and went off at their best pace. In desperation I spurred on the pony, and called to Clarence to try and round up the flying creatures from behind a clump of mimosa and shoot one himself if he could. Of course they passed the place sailing ere ever he reached it. As we galloped along our rush disturbed another band of aoul at close quarters, and in sheer desperation I checked my pony so suddenly that he sat down. I flung myself into a semblance of a position, and fired at the vanishing quarters of a fine-looking buck. He staggered and kicked out, but caught up again with his fellows, and they all disappeared in a cloud of dust. Mounting again, we dashed after them, and after a hard gallop came on the wounded animal going slower and far separated from the others. I dared not try a shot from the saddle, as the going was so bad; and if there is one thing I object to it is a cocked rifle at a gallop over ant-bear holes.
The aoul put on a spurt and my pony began to show signs of stress, and blundering terribly let me down suddenly over a large-sized hole. Much shaken, I gathered up my scattered wits and called to Clarence to ride the buck down. It was certainly wounded, and, I judged, badly so. To return to the famishing, reproachful camp without meat was unthinkable, as we had done it so often lately. I sat where I was tossed and meditated until I felt a burning sensation on my finger, sharp and stinging, and found it to be a scorpion of sorts. He paid toll for such a liberty, and the butt of my rifle finished him. I immediately sucked the stung finger perseveringly. What an odd thing it is—or seems odd to me, being unlearned—that no mischief ever comes from the poison being sucked into the system via the mouth. Not even the virulent poison of the rattler harms this way. When I got into camp I soaked my finger in ammonia, and so got off excellently well.
I bestrode my weary steed again, asking no more of it than a slow walk, and followed on the traces of Clarence and the aoul. I shouted after a while, and he replied. I came on him shortly, sitting by the dead aoul, resting between moments of butchery. I hadn’t heard a shot, but I must have been too dazed. We were a long way from camp, and the difficulty confronted us of packing so large a buck back. We could only do it conveniently, as I did not want to walk, minus the head and feet. The horns were good, but the head as a trophy was ruined by the way its neck was cut. The system of “hallal” doesn’t seem to allow of ordinary throat-cutting, far down, where the gash does not show. The gash must run from ear to ear, consequently it ruins a trophy for setting up purposes. Laden, we hied us back to what Nathaniel Gubbins would call “the home-sweet,” and were welcomed with glowing fires, on which the aoul, in parts, was immediately frizzling. The men gorged incontinently, as Cecily came in shortly after us with an oryx. These two beasts broke the run of bad luck, and afterwards, for a few days, we could not miss a shot. Our bullets seemed charmed. So did the men. They ate semiraw meat in such large quantities I wondered they didn’t get mange and lose their hair. There is no satisfying a Somali with meat. He cannot have sufficient. If a man would give all the substance of a buck to him it would utterly be condemned.
After what seemed like a very long period of doing very little, we judged our follower was well enough to be moved, and very glad we were to strike camp, as the men were none the better for so much idleness. It takes about an hour to strike camp, load up, and set out. The camels kneel for the process of lading, with an anchor in the shape of the head rope tied behind the knees. Unloading is a much more expeditious business. Everything comes off in a quarter the time taken up in putting it on. Our rifles travelled in cases made to take two at full length. They were not very cumbersome, and we felt that the terrific amount of banging about they would receive during loading and unloading made it a necessity to give them entire protection.
This, I feel sure, is the very moment your hardened, seasoned shikari would seize to make a few pertinent remarks on the merits of various sporting rifles. Anything I could say on the subject, either of rifles, or the shooting on our expedition, I am diffident of setting down. The time is not yet when masculinity will accept from a mere woman hints or views on a question so essentially man’s own. In the days of my youth I troubled myself to read all sorts of books on shooting: Hints to beginners on how to shoot, hints to beginners on how not to shoot; how to open your eyes; how to hold your rifle that you feel no recoil, how the rifle must be fitted to your shoulder or you cannot do any good at all with it; and (gem of all) how to be a good sportsman—as though one could learn that from books!
All these tomes of wisdom were written for man by man. I tried to follow out their often entirely opposite advice, but after a while, being a woman and therefore contrary, I “chucked” all systems and manufactured rules for myself. I don’t close either eye when I shoot. I shoot with both open. In Cecily’s case her left is the most reliable, and she makes provision accordingly. Our present rifles were not fitted to our shoulders. So far as I know, they would have done nicely for any one’s shoulder. Either we were making the best of things, putting up with inconveniences unknown to us, or else there is a frightful lot of rubbish written around a sportsman’s battery. In spite of any “advice” and “remarks” to the contrary, I consider my 12-bore, with soft lead spherical bullets, driven by drams of powder, ideal for lion and all more important, because dangerous, game. When one did get a bullet in it stayed in, and there was no wasting of its dreadness on the desert air. In reply to remarks as to the undoubted superiority of this, that, and the other rifle, &c., &c., &c., I merely answer oracularly: “May be.”